Post by Lorraine Law

Sometimes you have to make a leap in the dark and trust your instincts. A post by Mark Williams in The New Publishing Standard is the story of how Robert Galbraith’s (aka JK Rowling) ‘The Cuckoo’s Calling’ came to be published and how it is an argument for not blindly relying on AI detection tools for accepting or rejecting manuscripts (https://lnkd.in/efbhhqN7). It neatly explains how such detection tools make distinctions between human and AI-generated prose while failing to allow for linguistic caution, in a manner at odds with human editorial judgement and instinct, and potentially sowing distrust among authors writing under pseudonyms. Trust is also in short supply between the scientific research community and US Federal Government – the Society for Scholarly Publishing (https://lnkd.in/eF2kdhSr) and the International Association of Scientific, Technical & Medical Publishers (https://lnkd.in/eEr5md_h) are united in their condemnation of the proposed revisions to the Regulation for Federal Financial Assistance, which will restrict the way that research is conducted and disseminated and allow biased political interference. Unhappily, past experience tells me that even the loudest choruses of disapproval fail to halt such proposals, but what do I know? Well, quite a lot about medical editing, actually – since you didn’t ask. I’m sure I’m not alone in struggling to explain what I do for a living, but it’s difficult to dispel the stereotype of the pedantic and rigid grammarian, an experience shared by John McIntyre in one of his blogs (https://lnkd.in/eYkU-avw). Would people be more impressed if I said that I contribute to upholding the credibility and authority of my clients by delivering accurate, consistent and factually supported information for presentation in the public forum? Now, that’s what I call a position of trust. Photo by Markus Winkler https://lnkd.in/esEGJW23